Geetings Dear Ones!

It may come as a surprise to no one but myself, but (despite my unusually high cat quotient) it seems as though I am well on my way to becoming a man. “As if all those random beard hairs weren’t your first clue,” says Prudence. Yep. It’s me—putting the “men” in Menopause. For the past several weeks I feel as though I have been living out Rudyard Kipling’s “IF” poem. I’ve been meeting “with triumph and disaster” and trying to “treat those two imposters just the same.” I’ve been “talking with crowds and attempting to keep my virtue, and walking with kings (and the likes of Hanneke Cassel and Natalie MacMaster!) and trying not to lose the common touch.” And there’s been plenty of “heart and nerve and sinew straining,” to say the least. Anyone who has recently moved three hundred pounds of canned beans out of the cellar and into a snowbound truck will tell you that!

Most of the “keep your head when all about you are losing theirs…” occurred last month in the kitchen at PDB—the Pure Dead Brilliant Fiddle Camp I attend each year in February. (“Pure Dead Brilliant” is Scottish for “Wicked Awesome” which is Boston for “pretty darn special.”) The camp, which originated in my former home and is now at a large facility in central Massachusetts, is dedicated to the preservation and proliferation of Scottish music. My excellent team of volunteers and I attempt to feed 180 hungry fiddlers three times a day. This year’s dramas centered around uncooked meat and brand new ovens that no one realized had THREE buttons that needed to be pushed for actual heat to reach the interior. It turns out that one is not able to slow cook sixty pounds of beef over night with nothing but the light and fan on. We got to “start again at your beginnings and never breathe a word about your loss…” Thank goodness for a flattop grill and some fast cutters!

Unbeknownst to me, while I was dancing and cooking and having all the joy and chaos that comes with searching for the misplaced coriander at a fiddle camp, a bride was waiting outside my shop door back in Vermont. She had scheduled a fitting online and for some reason some gremlin glitch in my website let her do this, even though I had supposedly “blocked off” the time. We got lunch served and then I discovered I had a pocket full of increasingly furious texts. Triumph and disaster are flavors that must be blended carefully to make a nourishing broth for the soul. One doesn’t get what my grandmother used to call “a fat head” (big ego) when one realizes there is a side dish of “angry bride.”

After nearly twenty years of doing this camp—each year bigger and more overwhelming than the last—I am astonished to hear younger generations gushing things like “I want to be YOU when I grow up.” It’s bizarre and seems to be happening more and more often as I age—which is odd because each year I grow grayer, more grizzled, more crabby and less of anyone’s ideal of beauty or competence. I want to scream at them, “Do you know that there is an angry bride haunting me??!!” However, I think I know why… Because after my lifelong journey of being On The Mend, angry brides not-with-standing, I genuinely enjoy being Myself and seeing what happens to me next. I’m a better friend to this excitable, clumsy, hardworking, chatterbox, even though she often embarrasses me: She frequently says the Wrong Thing, she definitely eats too much, she doesn’t drink enough water, and most days she has to lie down to put her jeans on. I’m ok with all that. I’ve been through a lot—I’ve heard the truth I’ve spoken “twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,” and I have “watched the things you gave your life to broken, and stooped to build ‘em up with worn out tools.” I am proud of this strong, scrappy, askew little elf whose hair reeks of sautéing onions who still attempts to “fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds’ worth of distance run...” Still, I look with wonder at these youthful beauties, with their long legs and long hair, playing like cherubim on their fiddles. Why the hell would they want to be ME?? It boggles the mind. Who wants to be a middle-aged feral woman with stumpy legs, sore feet, thinning hair, and too many cats, who cannot do vibrato? (To be clear, it is I who cannot do vibrato. The cats manage it just fine.)

Then it hits me. What these cherubs really want is permission to be themselves—to inhabit the full magnificence of being Who They Are and being loved for THAT. That’s what they seek. They need their own version of “IF!” Though I have spent the better part of my life living into the ethics of this poem which was first presented to me at a Catholic retreat in high school, and I am sure I will one day make a rather pleasant fellow (I shall wear nothing but tweed and carry a pocket watch), whether mine “is the earth and everything that’s in it” or not (fifteen acres of bramble-encrusted Vermont clay and granite is plenty!) I have always believed that “being a Man my son” is merely a metaphor. One does not have to have a directional urethra to live Authentically, Generously, and Magnificently. That’s not the point of the poem. This is not about a DEI hire. It’s merit based. Everyone from tentative teenagers to feisty old crones may apply.

So! Here’s what I have learned so far:

1. There is no IF.

YOU, yes, YOU! You are lovable, worthy and enough. Just as you are. Even on your worst day. Your tribe needs you. There’s a waiting list. You made the cut. You made it here because you need to BE HERE. So show up. BE here!

2. Work hard. Be more contributor than consumer. Look for ways you can help. Working hard is actually fun, especially if you find others willing to work hard with you. Teamwork is transformative. Don’t think about what you can gain from it, just do it—let the Good Things that always come from participating surprise you. Find the nearest kitchen and get in there!

3. Be Yourself inside and out. Wear what makes you feel the most like YOU. For me, it’s sturdy boots, a grubby apron, and a hand-knitted cap to cover the fuzzy onion hair. For others it might be perfume and a cute dress. Enticing people to look at you is not the same as letting people SEE who you are.

4. Wherever you are, you are the host/hostess of your personal space. Are you welcoming? Do you invite those near you to share in your laughter and lunch? Or do you use your eyes like trowels to wedge the people you have turned to stone away from you? Be kind. It matters.

5. Take time to Play—to delight the inner child within you who thinks it would be super fun to have a castle play house. Then build it. Paint it in the middle of your home and make a jolly mess. Be the kind of grown-up who manifests the magic your inner child has always dreamed of now that you have access to keys, a credit card, and a truck bed that can accommodate a full sheet of plywood. Have fun! Let the Dreamy side of you see what Isn’t but Could Be. Then, share your toys. Invite others to play too.

6. Take Responsibility. If you make a mess, clean it up as best you can. Be polite. Say I’m Sorry. Ask what is yours to fix. Then fix it. This is the key to guilt-free living and blessed relief from shame. (“This should actually be number one,” says Prudence, “as it actually does the most good.”) Accidents happen. Brides who have waited outside a locked door for half an hour and have to reschedule find it much easier to forgive you when you are honest and contrite. (They even bring you cook books later!)

7. Don’t take too much responsibility. Some people are just plain mean and small and snotty. The ones most in need of love are those who behave in the most unloveable ways. Let that go. If we choose to show up and serve the majority (whom it is a privilege to serve), we must choose to show up and serve the minority too (though my inner middle-schooler must resist the urge to poke them with sharp forks as they walk by.) Choose to go on, despite your hurt, despite your angst, despite that undeserved cruelty none of us quite get over, not because they deserve your best but because YOU do. Their shadows make your Shine all the more necessary.

IF… If you include those who look lonely; IF you feed those who are hungry, you will never be lonely or hungry. IF you do all things with Love, you will never be without Love. True Serenity and Security originate in Service.

That’s what I have so far…

We will never be as good as some people think we are, and never as bad either. Sometimes I have to go home and cry and sleep and hug cattle and read to all the cats and binge watch British crime dramas in order to remember the “wo-Man” I know I can be. This is the challenge of being On The Mend—to constantly re-ravel the unraveled parts of us as we snag our hearts on the world’s jagged edges. If we don’t, we risk getting tangled up in all that ill-spun yarn and crashing… So when Triumph and Disaster come staggering into view, Keep your head! Pivot. Find something Kind or Pretty to make or celebrate and share. THIS is the work of real Men…ding.

Keep Mending my Dear Ones! Keep showing up as you are and doing your bit. I’m so proud of the work you are doing.

I love you SEW MUCH!

Yours aye,

Nancy